Walking is a rewarding and healthy way to discover the beauty of the area. The range of walks that are available for all levels of walkers in the Boyle area are so diverse it will be hard to choose which one to do first! With walks such as The Miners Way, the Moone Boy Trail and the Boyle Historical Trail, you will never be short of beautiful surroundings, TV show filming locations and historical gems. For more information about these walks and others see below.
Lough Key Forest Park have a number of walking trails available to explore all year round. Explore the 350 hectare park with its majestic trees, follies, bridges, native woodlands, Bog Garden, conifer forest and canals using the numerous way marked walks and trails.
Explore the lake shore and the quieter reaches of the park with this loop around Drumman’s Island. The trail is on forest road and footpath and crosses two excellent examples of bridge building on the estate at Drumman’s Bridge and the beautiful Fairy Bridge.
Trail Start Point: Visitor Centre Difficulty: Multi Access
Length: 3.5 kms Trail Finish Point: Visitor Centre
Time: 1 hour Trail Waymarking: Red
This trail takes you into the heart of the forest park. It begins at the car park and you pass through the parkland area of the park. Along the trail you will see evergreen oak, lime, majestic red cedars together with the more familiar ash and beech trees with beautiful ancient oak to be seen on Drumman’s Island. There are also several plantations of Norway Spruce to be seen. This trail forms part of the Historical Trail/Miners Way series of walks.
Trail Start Point: Car Park Difficulty: Easy
Length: 4.2 kms Trail Finish Point: Visitor Centre
Time: 1 hour-1.30 hrs Trail Waymarking: Green on map, yellow on trail
For those with exercise on their mind, the Slí Sláinte trail is the ideal place to get the heart going. Slí na Sláinte means ‘path to health’. Developed by the Irish Heart Foundation, it’s the new way to make walking for leisure and good health even more enjoyable.
Trail Start Point: Main entrance Difficulty: Easy
Length: 3 kms Trail Finish Point: Visitor Centre
Time: 30-40 mins Trail Waymarking: Slí Sláinte logo
Explore the lake shore and canal with its reed beds and waterfowl, and the bog garden with its impressive collection of azaleas, rhododendron and other acid loving plants. This trail is on forest road, canal bank, footpath and soft boggy ground.
Trail Start Point: Visitor Centre Difficulty: Moderate
Length: 4 kms Trail Finish Point: Visitor Centre
Time: 1-1.30 hrs Trail Waymarking: Blue
The Moone Boy Trail is an interactive walking/cycling trail which takes you through the various locations where on-site filming for Moone Boy took place throughout Boyle.
The Trail is accompanied with a FREE brochure (available from various businesses around Boyle including Una Bhan Tourism in the Grounds of King House) pinpointing the various locations where filming took place, including QR Codes. QR codes can be scanned by using your mobile phone or tablet (QR code scanning App must be installed on your phone or tablet) to show you edited footage of the Moone Boy series which is unique to each location. To see the online brochure please click here.
The Miners Way and Historical Trail are waymarked long distance walking routes that form a network of paths in Counties Roscommon, Sligo & Leitrim. They total 128 Kilometres (80 miles) with a total ascent of some 2150 metres. The maps in this guide are in strip format and the location map on the back of book shows the overall layout of the map strips and their relationships to the region in general.
The Miners Way and Suck Valley Walking books are available in Una Bhan Craft Shop, Grounds of King House, Boyle for €5 or on their online shop.
The route has been created by local communities in a unique collaboration. It follows the legendary fourteen-day march taken by Dónal Cam O’Sullivan Beare and his one thousand supporters in 1603, and it visits many of the places and communities shaped by their story.
The Way runs almost the length of the country and takes the walker and cyclist to some of its most beautiful and least explored areas in Ireland. Journey along the coast of the Beara Peninsula, across six mountain ranges, along the banks of the River Shannon and through the lake regions of Roscommon and Leitrim as you travel the Beara Breifne-Way and collect the stamps to fill the Way’s ‘passport’.
Boyle to Lough Key Cycleway The mainly off road cycle path travels from Lough Key Forest Park to the First Gate of Rockingham before turning right down Drum road, across the Woodenbridge to meet up with the walkway along by the canal. From the Marina it heads into Boyle via the Woodenbridge and Sligo roads before crossing the N61 and into Boyle via Military Road. €500,000 was allocated to the project by Minister for Rural and Commun..
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Boyle, Co. Roscommon, Ireland
